Bill Shaw
Bill "Arizona" Shaw was born in 2220 in the small Texan town of Robstown, leaving at an early age, he has since fought as a mercenary with the Rockport Mercenary Guild, a revolutionary with the People's Legion, and a lawman in The Highlands and finally Ugly Buffalo. All with his Sig Sauer on his hip, AR-15 on his back and machine-gun on his horse. Biography Early Years Bill was born in Robstown to two homesteaders; Virgina and Eddy Shaw and although he was born in Robstown he didn't actually live within the town's limits. Rather, he and his parents resided on a small dirt farm outside of town, growing corn, peas and beans which they trade in town after every harvest. Growing up on his parents small abode he spent most of his days ripping roots and stunted corn stalks out of their small field and making runs into Robstown with his father to retrieve seed or tools, or to help his mother trade their crops. However, his youth was anything but the peaceful life of a homestead farmer, when he wasn't tilling the fields, he was trading shots with the local raider gangs that often harassed his family. Through necessity he learned to shoot rather well with his father's Homestead Rifle (a modified caravan shotgun with two extra barrels placed next to the other two, with rifled barrels), however, he grew to dislike the rifle and all other "cowboy" like arms as he became more acquainted with the assault weapons used by the raiders that assailed the farm. After one particular attack, Bill ventured out with his family to clean up the corpses of the dead raiders and found on one an AR-15, he took a liking to the rifle and decided to keep it, scavenging a number of .556 rounds off the dead raiders. From that point forward the AR-15 would constantly remain at his side as he traversed the wastes and went up against the various bandits and Comancheros that inhabited Southern Texas. However, as he reached his teenage years, Bill became restless, his little Farm life was becoming dull, the raiders were now more concentrated on going after each other than attacking a small place like his home and to that end, his parents were considering a move to Robstown. After talking it over with his parents, Bill decided to go out and explore the wasteland, to find employment, adventure, riches and hopefully not meet his end at the hands of a comanchero. With that, Bill set off from his home and headed south towards the fine little town of Rockport. Mercenary Work On his way towards Rockport, Bill, having traveled some distance that day, decided to stop at a small way station located along the road between Rockport and Robstown. The way station, named Sheperd's Refuge, was a medium sized place made of a mix of sod bricks and wooden boards, Bill hitched his horse and promptly entered the dimly lit interior. Inside, he found a bar and grill and sat down to enjoy a meal of grill mantis legs and beer, while he ate he overheard the bartender telling another patron about a group of Rockport Mercenaries that stopped in to grab a bite and a drink. Overhearing this, Bill inquired as to what the Rockport Mercenary Guild was, the bartender replied that they were a fearsome group of bounty hunters and soldiers of fortune that had been making a name for itself since 2210. Intrigued Bill resolved to seek out these mercenaries and join their ranks in order to gain the notoriety he seeked. That next day Bill awoke in the cot he had been provided and set off for Rockport, traveling a few miles East towards the irradiated Gulf of Mexico he came upon the town of Rockport along the tail end of the Corpse Coast. He entered the town and found the place crawling with scores of armed mercenaries, merchants, clients, and homesteaders all looking to hire the Guild's well-trained soldiers. Finding an office labeled recruiting he entered and inquired as to how one joins the Guild. The man running the desk, looked Bill up and down and said that he could sign up but in order to actually join the guild he'd have to pass a training course. Accepting the challenge he signed up and prepared for the training course, that night he was awoken by a shouting voice, it was the Guild's training officer and thus began the three weeks of hell that was to be the Guild's training course. In the end, he passed and was inducted into the Guild and thus was given his first assignment as a mercenary. The first assignment that he was given as a member of the Guild was to hunt down the notorious arms dealer; Plasma Paul Falcone. Paul was an arms dealer who specialized in selling energy weapons to buyers in the Distrito Capital, most notably Los Martillos, who hoped that the energy weapons and their armored bulldozers would allow them to gain the advantage and thus take control of central Ciudad Victoria. Thus Bill and the team of mercenaries he was assigned to set off for Paul's last known location, the small town of Rio Hondo. Rio Hondo like many towns along the Rio Grande survived through providing a service to the homesteaders that lived along the Rio Grande and the merchants and cattlemen that passed through the area. Rio Hondo supplied arms, the little town acted as a massive arms bazaar for merchants headed south into the turbulent region of the Border Country and thus had numerous arms dealers dwelling within the town as permanent residents, who sold their arms alongside those that trickled into town through traveling merchants that passed through. When they arrived in Rio Hondo, they found that Paul, despite the bounty on his head, hadn't left town. Instead, he hid behind a group of guards that worked for his family and upon seeing the approaching Rockport Mercenaries went for their guns. In a brief moment, the four-man team had dropped to the ground and had filled the two guards with led. They then rushed the store's front door and charged in on the heels of a flash bang, putting down two more guards, one by Bill's hand. They then rushed the back office and found Paul struggling to get out his back window, in a second he had two bullets in his back. After slewing Paul and his guards, they tossed Paul's corpse over the saddle of their newest member (Bill) and rode off back towards Rockport. Once there they collected Paul's bounty and celebrated with a round of beers at a local cantina. Following this success, the team would go on to haul in numerous of other bounties from all across the Corpse Coast and Tamaulipas. Of all these bounties they collected, several stick out. One particular bounty that Bill and his partners pursued was for the man known as Julius Andronicus, the oddly named ruffian had come from out West wearing old football padding and shouldering a powerful .308 Hunting Rifle. Julius was wanted for killing the sheriff and deputy of the nearby border town of Greer's Landing, with a bounty on his head of 8,000 caps, Bill, and his teammates could hardly resist. They tracked Julius back to his hideout in The Highlands, after that scaling the treacherous mountain that he lived upon, did they find his "hideout". In reality it was nothing more than a cave he had taken over as his temporary home and as they approached they saw him move to a large mass covered by a blanket, as he yanked the sheet off it was revealed to be an old MG-3, a pre-war machine gun. Realizing all too late what the weapon was, they just barely hit the ground when bullets started snapping over their heads. Taking cover behind some rocks, the team's veteran signaled for a smoke grenade to be tossed, when the grenade was out, and the smoke began to disperse, the veteran and Bill rushed around the rock and began moving up along the side of Julius' position. Julius meanwhile had been firing blindly into the smoke, challenging the profligates to come out and fight like real men, he never saw the vet and Bill get up behind him and put two bullets into his back. As they looked about Julius' camp, they found a large supply of arms, ammunition and provisions (likely taken from caravans he had ambushed) along with documents with details on every major settlement in the Texas-Tamaulipas area, all with the same ending; Ave True to Caesar. They took as much of his gear as they could and using the documents as kindling, set the rest ablaze. As the rest of the group carried Julius' corpse down the slope to their waiting horses, Bill spied his old MG-3 and decided not to leave such a weapon to rust away in the wastes and thus claimed it as his own, tethering it to his horse's side. Another well-known bounty that was collected by Bill and his compadres was that of Charles J. Mahone, the self-stylized "Indian Fighter" and renowned bounty hunter and mercenary who had made himself a legend by hauling in the corpses of rogue Lipan chiefs. However, as much as the frontier folk and homesteaders appreciated his work, he had at some point along the line contracted syphilis and had gone absolutely insane, now he rode among the peaceful Lipan and the border towns, Laser Rifle in hand killing anyone who crossed his path. He had left a trail of bloody corpses from the Rio Grande all the way to La Ciudadela and after waylaying more than a few Citadel caravans the Nobles had had enough. They used their vast fortune to place a bounty of Charles and promised a place among the Royal Nobility to anyone who could bring in the corpse of Charles J. Mahone. With that kind of reward, every bounty hunter and mercenary within the Border Country was hunting "Mad Mahone" and more than a few met their ends at the hands of Charles' laser rifle. Eventually, it was Bill and his crew who caught up with Charles and after a protracted gun battle and chase, they slew old Charles. They tossed his bloody corpse over their saddles and rode off for La Ciudadela. Once at the Citadel, they requested an audience with the Noble, who had placed the bounty, Count Bartolomeo Riza and showed off their kill. Riza was so elated to see the bane of his trading company finally killed that he paid the mercenaries on the spot, and three weeks later after clearing it with the other members of the Nobility and Rey Valentino, Bill, and his compatriots were made Nobles within the Kingdom of Mexico. Naturally as nobles of the group began to serve his royal majesty, tracking down Comancheros that harassed the emerging Citadel's caravans on the side while tracking other bounties. One of the last bounties Bill and his friends collected was on the infamous Comanchero and Slaver Sir Reginald Cutler. Cutler was at one point a soldier in the Provisional Defense Force when he decided that the soldiering life wasn't for him. Thus he decided to desert from his platoon, posted at some remote post in The Saltlands. However, his CO found out about his plans and tried to place Reginald under arrest, what followed was a short shootout and Reginald making a mad dash for the horizon. After several weeks on the trail, running from PDF mounted patrols he was finally in the clear and thus formed his own crew of Comancheros. He went on to fully embrace the image of British colonialism that his heritage represented and thus set off to raid throughout Tamaulipas dressed in a crimson red uniform, white pith helmet and gloves and his old Webley revolver in his hand. Bill and company tracked him to his "fort" located out in the sticks of the Cattle Country, there the four-man team realized they couldn't possibly take out the fort all on their own and thus sent two men back to retrieve more men. Then a day later with a force of 40 Rockport mercenaries, they rushed the fort, sprinting across the vast open ground between their concealed positions and the fort's dirt-mound walls. They came under small arms fire, and several mercenaries were killed, but luckily enough were able to make it inside the fort's walls to overwhelm the defenders and kill Reginald in a torrent of gunfire and explosives. However, when they split the bounty money, they found they each got hardly anything. This lack of payoff and a growing boredom with his profession led Bill to resign from the Guild and seek employment elsewhere. El Revolutionario Símbolo Leaving the service of the Rockport Mercenary Guild, Bill headed South towards Mexico and the Border Country where he moved to the rapidly growing Citadel. There with his title as a Noble he was given access to the Citadel's bunker and all the amenities within. After several weeks residing within the bunker and doing a whole bunch of nothing, Bill finally sought to get up and actually accomplish something. Thus he went to the Noble that had made him a member of the nobility, Count Bartolomeo Riza and asked if there was anything he could do to help the King and his cause to tame the wastes, surprised by this question Riza replied that he could help fight the new war against the Comancheros. The date being 2251, Rey Mateo Segundo had just declared war on the Comancheros once again and was currently waging a war to bring the Comancheros and their chief Sam Baxter to the gallows. Accepting this new assignment, Bill set out from the soft living off the Citadel and out into the wastes a troop of 15 royal soldiers in tow. They patrolled along the Rio Grande for weeks and operating from their base in Casa Roja they managed to kill scores of Comancheros all across the range of the Citadel's power. Bill's actions earned him the praise of his colleagues and more than a few fat sacks full of pesos, he would eventually retire back to the Citadel with a ton of cash and a successful military career under his career. In the Citadel's shanty town, he was given the "Fighting Duke" was given the position as a second in command of the Citadel's police force. Within this post, he helped keep the streets of the shantytown clean (as clean as a shantytown can get) and keep the comancheros out of the town. However, after more than a decade of loyal service to the Rey and the Citadel he suffered severe disillusionment when the People's Legion and Ciudadela began their long war for control of the Citadel itself. Despite the ongoing conflict with the People's Legion, the now older Bill had since left the service of the Citadel's police force to run a small caravan operation. On one such run up to the trading post of Casa Roja, he came upon a village of peasants, once loyal subjects of the Rey had only recently sided with La Legion de La Gente. For this, the Rey had sent one of the Army's most notorious officers; Franco Mares. Franco was the son of a paisano couple who had joined the army to escape a life of working on his hands and knees in the fields. Within the army, he earned a reputation as a draconian and a ruthless loyalist to the King and would often use violent tactics when dealing with Comancheros and communists, everything from torcher to wholesale slaughter like the act he had committed on the small village. Bill witnessed Citadel soldiers and members of La Guardia del Rey (a force he had always admired) moving about the burned remains of the village, shooting corpses, executing wounded paisanos and erasing any sign that there was once a village there. This kind of brutality pushed Bill over the edge and convinced him to defect to the ranks of the People's Legion, and fight against the Ciudadela and all it stood for. He promptly sold off his caravan company and tracked down the nearest People's Legion recruiter. In secret he agreed to join La Legion de La Gente, he quietly left the Citadel with his things and set off to join the Legion's forces. However, upon his arrival with the Legion, he was treated with an air of mistrust, he was a member of the Citadel's nobility after all. Thus he was placed in a position in which he could be monitored very closely, and in order to prove his loyalty, he was ordered to help the Legion in an upcoming operation against the Rey's Army. The Citadel was having a large column of troops move into the area of Legion's control with the expressed goal of shooting its way to the Rio Grande. This Sherman style march to the Rio Grande was part of a new tactic to try and force the People's Legion out into the open and defeat it in an open battle. Bill wanting nothing more than to prove his loyalty to his new comrades agreed to the venture, taking his MG-3 to where the ambush was setup he set constructed a rough fighting position with rocks he found around him. There he set up his machine gun and waited for the column. An hour of waiting, paid off in the noise of braying horses and the crunch of boots on rock and sand. Manning his machine gun, Bill watched as a column of Citadel troops emerged from a small pass and continued down the road towards the hidden Legionnaires' positions. Bill readied his machine gun, and when the column passed the outer range marker, he and the rest of the Legionnaires opened up. Bill squeezed the trigger on his MG-3 he sent a stream of 7.62mm bullets down range, mowing down Royal troops. He kept his fire up, as the Citadel troopers tried to force their way across the open area to the Legionnaires' positions, but as he fired into the horde of royal troops he felt pangs of guilt, he had served with these men, led them and maybe even knew a few of them. However, he buried these thoughts until the shooting had ended and the Citadel troops had fallen back. Surveying their work the Legionnaires gave a cheer and congratulated Bill on his sharpshooting. However, Bill was anything but pleased with himself, feeling guilty over his blatant betrayal of La Ciudadela and all the rage from seeing the massacre having melted away, he decided the only rational thing to do was deserted again. That night as the column of Legionnaires marched back towards their camp, Bill ducked out of the column and promptly set off on his own for his pre-determined destination; The Highlands. There he hoped he could find some peace and quiet (or at least some seclusion) and escape the fighting of the Border Country. The Highlands He hadn't spent half a day in The Highlands when he encountered an ambushed caravan. God knows what hit the caravan but whatever it had been had smashed the Caravaneer, merchant, and his guards into a pulp. Frightened by the prospect of what could've caused the carnage he decided to head to the nearest way station and report his findings. After riding for about an hour he came upon a small gas station that two men had turned into a small general store, Bill was only inside the small store for a moment when he felt a knot form in his stomach. Feeling that something was amiss, he quickly rattled off what he had found to the man running the front desk and left in a hurry. As he rode off down the road, he hardly noticed one of the figures aiming with at him from behind. However, he covered enough distance that he avoided the bullet to the back. Luckily for Bill, he quickly came upon a small Caravanserai that didn't give him the willies and promptly stopped to rent a room and get a hot meal and maybe even a shower. He got all three as he rented a room inside and a stable for his horse. He was then treated to a good meal of Bighorner, roasted over an open fire and a much-needed shower. There he slept for the night and awoke early the next morning to get first grabs at breakfast and to decide on his next destination. As he ate his breakfast of Bighorner and greens, he was approached by an elderly Spanish woman, she was crying and speaking hysterically in Spanish. Calling over one of the native attendants, he asked him to interpret for the woman, what she had to say was rather disturbing, she went on about how her son and grandsons had been kidnapped by a group of Super Mutants that had ambushed their Bighorner drive. Bill's first thought was that this wasn't his issue, but his pity for the old woman quickly fought through his jaded mentality and he agreed to track down the woman's family. Going to the site of the ambush he found a number of shell casings from several high power weapons and dozens more casings of a smaller caliber. Quickly finding tracks he followed them into the rugged hills, they ended at the top of a small crater, down below were six or seven Super Mutants standing a billowing fire and a roasting Brahmin (split longways) and a ramshackle corral that now housed a small herd of Bighorners. Shouldering his AR-15 and loading a full magazine in he decided he was either going to free the captives that sat bound behind the mutants or die trying. Rearing his horse into a gallop he raced into the crater firing wildly, he struck a few of the mutants and as he brought his horse he fired off the remnants of his clip, killing three of the mutants. The remainder either dove for their guns or grabbed any blunt object near them with one ripping the leg off the roasting Brahmin. They then rushed Bill, Bill, in turn, rode around the charging group of mutants and shot two more, the remaining three decided it wasn't worth it and took off into the hills with Bill dropping another as he ran. Turning to the captives he quickly untied them, they thanked him by pitching in as much money as they could, and when Bill turned down their meager payment, they insisted that he get paid in some manner. The youngest son, promptly walked over to a pile of old packs that they had tossed over their pack brahmin and retrieved a gleaming pistol, a pre-war Sig Sauer, and it served as payment for Bill's actions. After helping the three round up their herd of Bighorners and arm themselves with some of the mutants dropped weapons he headed back to the Caravanserai to get the rest of his gear. When he returned, he found that his room and stall had been robbed, and he was left with basically nothing but the little gear he had on him. Angered and frustrated at having lost his prized machine gun, he suddenly wished he had taken the caps the boys had offered him. However, as he began to look for work, he was shocked to find that he attained a reputation from his rescue of the three men. Soon he had been approached by another Bighorner rancher who was having issues with the Super Mutant cattle rustlers and was looking for an experienced mercenary to help clear them out. Despite his old age, Bill accepted, mounting his horse he followed the rancher back to his ranch and waited around until night came. Around 12 pm the huge forms of the Super Mutants appeared and waited for them to come out in the open and then pumped a whole clip of .556 rounds into the advancing group, killing several and sending the rest packing. Again he was approached by another rancher with Super Mutant troubles and again he sent the mutants looking for a new ranch to victimize, and soon a legend began to form around Bill as he became known as the "Super Mutant Killer" working out of the Caravanserai. Yet one day on his way home from a job he heard a voice call to him from behind, turning in his saddle, he was startled to see a Super Mutant, instinctively went for his Sig Sauer, but the mutant stopped him. What surprised Bill was that the mutant's speech wasn't slurred in any way, he was 1st Generation. He introduced himself as Gaucho. He was a 1st Generation Super Mutant that had emigrated to Tamaulipas in an attempt to escape persecution. Instead, he had found just as much distrust and bigotry, and there was back in California. As the two talked, he suddenly produced a large machine gun from the pack he had, saying he had found it on a group of dead Comancheros, and the initials stenciled on the trigger matched Bill's. As the two talked Gaucho told Bill about how he had worked as a rustler in the Cattle Country when Cal Jackson stirred up the local Super Mutant tribes, and then left the area to live in the Highlands. After their talk, Bill bid Gaucho goodbye and rode off back to the Caravanserai. Ugly Buffalo Blues However, after his meeting with Gaucho, Bill was a bit more hesitant about going after Super Mutants and while he had enjoyed the pay out had afforded him he decided to leave the Highlands and seek employment elsewhere. By this time Bill was in his late 50s and was simply looking for a place to settle down and maybe find a wife. Leaving the caravanserai with a caravan he headed Northwest and ended up right in the war-torn Corridor, there the caravan he was riding with made a stop in the small town of Zancuso, here he sold his horse and used the caps to buy supplies and was preparing to set on his own when suddenly one of the wagons that was among the caravan train went up in a massive geyser of dirt and explosives. Twisting around to see what has happened a crowd of horsemen race out from behind cover and in the confused group of merchants. The riders are from Los Diamondbacks, the Diamondbacks had made it a policy to prevent any sort of caravans from entering territory controlled by their enemies, namely the Menendez Cartel and NCSA. Dropping his gear, Bill grabs up his AR-15 and cuts down three of the riders. However, realizing that he has been outmatched by his opponents, he grabs up his things and runs off down the road, leaving the caravan to suffer its fate. After several hours of walking with his massive amount of baggage, he comes into the town of Ugly Buffalo, a small trading and farming town situated along the Rio Grande. Finding the town's cantina, he drops his things off at the door and enters the bar to grab a refreshment. After knocking back a few shots of tequila to calm his nerves, he went to go see about getting some transportation. Going to the general store, he was angered to find that the town had sold it's last horse to a merchant three days prior. Now stuck in the town with only the clothes and shoes on his back he decided to see about seeking employment and would spend several months working odd jobs for the town store, cantina and the various merchants who came to trade in the town. Yet it was when the town was threatened by a gang of slavers, led by the infamous Morgan Blake attacked the town that Bill found his new profession for the town. The slavers were mounted on horseback and had ridden into the town firing wildly into the various buildings and stores that dotted the town's spread. Bill, who had been buying a drink, stepped outside with his Sig Sauer in hand and brought down two slavers, as the slavers rode about he took down a third and a fourth bandito before the rest decided to make for the hills. The townsfolk were so impressed by his shooting that they asked him to be their new sheriff, since their previous lawmen had moved on to greener pastures several weeks before. Happy to be leaving his life of menial labor behind he accepted the position and has been serving the town ever since. Equipment Bill's equipment tends to separate him from his fellow wastelanders in the Tamaulipas-Texas region in the sense that he carries no arms that one would consider to be western or cowboy in nature. Rather Bill tends to stick to weaponry that are generally pre-war in make and design, meaning he walks the wastes with pistols, rather than revolvers, an assault carbine rather than a repeater, and a machine gun over any of the alternatives. To give a complete breakdown of his choice in weaponry, his Sig Sauer shall be first. In an oiled holster, Bill carries a Sig Sauer P226, a semi-automatic service pistol from the pre-war days that he picked up off a arms merchant while on his various travels throughout Texas. It fires a powerful .40 S&W round and serves as Bill's backup when he can't bring his AR-15 on whatever the threat may be. The AR-15 that is slung over his back or more than often, cradled in his arms was at one point the weapon for an Annaville Red, who was killed during a raid on his family's farm outside Robstown. Since then is has served as his go-to weapon, having used it through numerous firefights with everything from bandits, to Super Mutants and its more than capable at bringing down anything that threatens it's owner. Lastly, is his MG-3, this heavy and powerful weapon, picked off the corpse of a dead Legionnaire has only been used by Bill a few times, but when it is put into action it has proven it's worth the extra weight as it sweeps away anything the Sig Sauer or AR-15 can't. Outside of his weaponry, Bill carries a number of other pieces of equipment, on his horse he has a few water bags slung over the horse's flanks for the long trips through the desert. Along with these, he has several pouches for storing his extra gear; a weapon repair kit, bandages, and med-x, radiation supplies, spare ammunition, food and bits of scrap metal for bartering. Personality Bill has been since his youth a very reserved person, conversations with him are usually quick, short and to the point. With him, there is very little room for friendly conversation in a world that seems to constantly want you dead, this mentality he had developed through years of dealing with the wasteland's ugliest, and nastiest fiends. The fact that he is the sole survivor of his family (His parents were killed in the Robstown massacre) has also made him a bit of a loner who tends to avoid contact with people, and remains focused solely on his work. Appearance In his younger years, Bill was tan with dirty brown hair, however as he grew older, his hair grayed (as expected) and he grew out a mustache that he's kept ever since. Physically he isn't the best-built person around, he's scrawny to a degree but has enough mass to no appear like a twig in clothing. In terms of clothing, Bill will often wear a white shirt with black chaps, this is joined by either a Stetson cowboy hat or a fedora. He has a holster for his Sig Sauer and has spots a bandoleer that he keeps slung over his shoulder, crossing the strap for his AR-15. Quotes By About Category:Tamaulipas Category:Mexico Category:Characters Category:Mercenaries